Alexandria, VA – On Wednesday, The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission's Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board approved Draft Addendum IV for public comment. The addendum proposes new fishing mortality reference points, as recommended by the 2013 benchmark stock assessment, and management measures to reduce mortalilty to a level at or below the proposed target within one or three years.

The Draft Addendum responds to results of the 2013 Atlantic striped bass benchmark assessment indicating mortality in 2012 was above the proposed target, and female spawning stock biomass has been steadily declining below the target since 2006.

This means even though the stock is not overfished and overfishing is not occurring, the biomass is approaching its overfished threshold and stock projections show that the spawning stock biomass will likely fall below the threshold in the coming years. In addition, a similar decline has been observed in total harvest.

The Draft Addendum proposes management options to reduce fishing mortality to the target level. The harvest reductions would be based on percent reductions of the 2013 harvest to be implemented starting in 2015.

It is anticipated the majority of Atlantic coastal states will conduct public hearings on the Draft Addendum. Details of those hearing will be released once they become finalized. For more information, contact Mike Waine, at mwaine@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740.